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The 70-year thing isn't meant to be an exact figure, but a very rough estimate or a ball park figurew, IMO. A ship at Warp 9 or so might average about 1000 light-years per year, taking into account periodic stops whenever necessary.

Personally, I think Janeway was being optimistic. I think most ships can only sustain Warp 9 and beyond speeds for a relatively short period of time but will spend most of a voyage around Warp 6 to prevent engine burnout and to conserve fuel.

Considering Seven, made a song and dance about using Borg cartography to cut 3 years off the journey, I think it's a reliably accurate number, and as the years went on, they did reduce the number of years they expected to be in transit in relation against all their short cuts.

In that sense, shaving off three years is relative to the distance the ship has already traveled.

__________________"Don't sweat the small stuff--it makes you small-minded..."

It's a manly man thing to say such comments "I listen to my balls" or "I'm letting my balls take the lead" or even in rare occasions "My ball's spider-sense is tingling"... have you ever seen the British Sitcom "How Not to Live Your Life"? The lead in that is always asking his balls questions as if they each had a mind of their own the equal to the one on top of his shoulders (Add it to the list.).

I did't mean that you could follow your queefs to homespace, but that a queef in a vacuum might open a door into another dimension, perhaps one even with no shrimp.

I meant that after you had left reality as you know it, you might be so lost that asking directions would be pointless, not that your cooch would be some comparable artical to Rudolphs red shiney nose leading Santa back to the pole.

Not everyone wants to return to a pole.

So. What is in this other dimension? And aren't you jealous you can't go there?

As a few may have noticed, I've been watching Voyager episodes lately, and someone brought this to my attention. They say that Voyager is over 70,000 light years from the Alpha Quadrant, and Voyager is a vessel capable of sustained flight at Warp 9.975 (which is over 21,000 times the speed of light, or a light year every 25 minutes). So with that said, shouldn't the flight of Voyager back to the Alpha Quadrant take between 3 and 4 years, instead of 70 years like we're told?

Click on the link in my sig, and fast-forward the video to 7:58 for a comparison of warp speeds in TOS and VOY.

There is no "real" speed/time/distance table for Star Trek; the writers never used the ones in the technical manuals. The ships move at the speed of plot.

In "Balance of Terror" and "The Neutral Zone" the RNZ is so far from the Federation that communications take days to go back and forth from HQ. In the movie First Contact, not only do they get a live feed from the battle in Earth's solar system, but getting there takes only a tiny warp jump.

In Q Who it was stated the Enterprise had been sent 7,000 light years away from the edge of Federation Space. They also said it would take them two years and seven months to get back.

So... Voyager was much slower than the old Enterprise? It should have only taken 30 years.

Actually, it is said that the Enterprise was 7000 ly from where it was previously, not the edge of Fed space. The edge of Fed space could be closer than the original position.

As for Janeway, she would have had a much shorter trip if she'd headed for the Bojaran wormhole.

__________________
"The single biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place." - G. B. Shaw
"Haters gonna hate. Gushers gonna gush. Pity those in-between that simply wish to discuss." - Me.

One of the more "technical" star trek websites I saw theorized that space was "thicker" in some places than others and as such there were "highways" that allowed faster travel, that didn't exist in the Delta Quadrant.

He uses the Chase as an episode where the Enterprise covered half the quadrant in a space of a few days as justification for that. I dunno.

As for Janeway, she would have had a much shorter trip if she'd headed for the Bojaran wormhole.

Yeah, a few dominion ships shooting Voyager to pieces on grounds of a federation ship entering their homeland after war was declared would indeed have cut the journey home short.

While war had not yet officially been declared, there's been several skirmishes between the Dominion and Starfleet (and the Klingons) starting in 2370, over a year before Voyager launched on her fated flight into the Badlands.

Aunt Kathy had the choice between heading for a wormhole of questionable stability (remember, it was the first of its kind that didn't vanish soon after appearing and there was no indication how long it would exist for) in the middle of enemy territory, or go the long way through mostly uncharted space where the chance of meeting friend was as big as the chance of meeting foe.

At conventions, Berman takes his shoe off and repeatedly slams it on the podium like a gavel so that his voice can break through the din of overlapping fangasms... "Equidistant! They're equidistant! EQI-DISTANT!!!"

Besides.

Berman fucked up the map for the first few years, according to a map they showed on screen the alpha and beta quadrants were inverted... IE the Okuda's had a sick day, and the rats did play... This was fixed years later but they had trekked 40 thousand light years before anyone ever even mentioned the border to the Beta Quadrant (Renaissance Man) but gammy Janeway turned up to save the day before any writer could make such headway with the impending nature of if the delta flyer blew up again, they'd have to call it's replacement the Beta Flyer.

In Q Who it was stated the Enterprise had been sent 7,000 light years away from the edge of Federation Space. They also said it would take them two years and seven months to get back.

So... Voyager was much slower than the old Enterprise? It should have only taken 30 years.

Actually, it is said that the Enterprise was 7000 ly from where it was previously, not the edge of Fed space. The edge of Fed space could be closer than the original position.

As for Janeway, she would have had a much shorter trip if she'd headed for the Bojaran wormhole.

The map I've seen, shows a Direct path from The Caretaker to the Gamma Quadrant entrance of the Wormhole, may be a tiny bit shorter, maybe a couple years. However, that would entail crossing the spiral arms, through areas sparsely populated with Stars, which would mean fewer opportunities for resupply, etc. Plus, who knows what may happen to that wormhole in the 68 years it took to get there (if you were indeed able to save 2 years). If the wormhole wasn't available when they got there, they'd be twice as far away from home as when they started.

Not twice as far away, merely the same distance they started with - but they would have doubled the length of their overall trip. No point in doing that.

A map with inverted Alpha and Beta Quadrants? Where? Intriguing...

Apparently they never did reach the border of Beta; the onscreen maps and the distance references nicely allow for that.

Timo Saloniemi

Nah, they'd be almost twice as far away as when they started. The Gamma Quadrant Wormhole entrance is near the top of the Gamma Quadrant, so they'd have to traverse almost 100% of Gamma, and then almost all of Alpha to get to Federation Space (Or going the other way, they'd have to go through all of Delta and most of Beta, plus backtrack the trip through Gamma).

How would the back corner of Gamma be any farther away from home than the back corner of Delta? The distance from both locations to Earth is identical; sailing for the Gamma end of the wormhole would not take our heroes farther away from home, even though it would be wasted sailing. It would just take them to the same distance they started from, after which it would be their choice whether to sail directly for home, or first sail back to Delta to avoid encounters with the Jem'Hadar.

How would the back corner of Gamma be any farther away from home than the back corner of Delta? The distance from both locations to Earth is identical; sailing for the Gamma end of the wormhole would not take our heroes farther away from home, even though it would be wasted sailing. It would just take them to the same distance they started from, after which it would be their choice whether to sail directly for home, or first sail back to Delta to avoid encounters with the Jem'Hadar.

Timo Saloniemi

Because a straight shot from the Gamma side of the Wormhole, would take you through Galactic center, so, you have the extra distance going around Galactic Center, you don't have that issue with Kazon Territory, because you're already on the outer edge